With warnings emerging from China that economic conditions may be increasingly unstable and gender equality slipping backwards, visiting professor Linda Jakobson joins an expert panel to take the pulse of China and look ahead to 2015. Listen online

If Ben Carson's prominent role in Republican politics resonates with even a fairly small section of the African-American community as well as Tea Party conservatives, it could just tip the balance the GOP's way in 2016, says research associate John Barron. Read article

The American TV show, Empire, following the dramas of a family-run hip-hop music empire, debuts in Australia this week. Using the African-American dominated hip-hop industry, lecturer Rebecca Sheehan dissects the issues of race, class, masculinity and domestic violence raised by the show. Listen online

How will history remember the presidency of George W. Bush? Author and historian James Mann speaks to research associate Tom Switzer, arguing that the verdict won’t be favourable, given most of his far-reaching and important initiatives turned out disastrously. Listen online

Political leadership is lagging behind the commitments that the Australian army is making to supporting the United States in it's fight in Iraq. Alliance 21 director James Brown looks at why Australia is increasing its troop comitment. Listen online

The intensified US–Australian relationship in recent years has attracted little congressional attention and awareness among the American public. Nevertheless, CEO Bates Gill and research associate Tom Switzer say Australia now figures more prominently in US foreign policy than at any time since the Second World War. Read article

Barack Obama has used a foreign policy address to cast jihadists and Islamic State militants as outsiders and ideological extremists in an attempt to build a coalition of allies in the Middle East. Associate professor Brendon O'Connor analyses the speech, contrasting it with Republican Jeb Bush's tough talk on the issue. Watch online

US President Barack Obama has asked Congress to back a global war against the Islamic State group, but with caveats on sending in US ground forces. Research associate Tom Switzer looks at the motivation for seeking this authorisation